“About IT start-ups and venture financing”, or “How I went to eat bread”
Fish and sea
It smells like a fisherman.
In the bakery only
No smell!
(based on children's poem)
From the author: Below in the art form my own impressions of the process of searching for venture financing for one IT startup are presented. All coincidences with real names and companies are random, all conclusions from reading this text are on the conscience of the reader.
One morning I went outside to buy a breakfast for breakfast ... The mood was excellent, there was a small change in my pocket, and in my head there were ideas about which of the bakeries to look into, since there were a lot of them in my area.
')
Alas, but the nearest bakery was closed - on the door hung a large barn lock and the announcement: “Dear customers! Our shop sells lots of rolls from 1 million units of goods. If you need only a few pieces, think about how to convince us that you need a million pieces or more! ”
Thank God, across the road, I saw another bakery. Second - and I already entered her door. The seller did not wait:
- Do you want to buy a loaf from us? We would love to, but we serve only trolleybus drivers with a height of at least 182 cm. Sorry and goodbye!
On the threshold of the third bakery, a young man with a badge on his chest "junior assistant to the second seller" smoked melancholically. After listening to my request for bread, he gave me a critical look: "No, I am not interested!". I tried to squeeze through the doorway, but the fellow turned out to be quicker, taking him first and spreading his arms to the sides. “May I come in, I want to talk to your director! Maybe you are not interested, but he will be? ”-“ Gee! If our director had talked with every customer, he would have no time even to devour! ”The young man said and turned his back on me, making it clear that our conversation was over.
But in the fourth bakery a pleasant surprise was waiting for me - the seller agreed to sell me bread, but ... no, I understand that good bread cannot be cheap, but ask for one small slice of 70% of the amount in my pocket! .. In short, I turned and left himself.
The fifth bakery grieved me with a closed door, on which, alas, there was no useful information - neither the telephone nor the e-mail. Nothing at all. “Wow, attitude towards customers,” I thought, and headed for the next bakery, located nearby.
The sixth bakery was the exact opposite of the fifth - this is what “small business facing the buyer” means! The bakery was closed, but the ad reported all the information I needed: “Hello! Our store does not work, but we are fine! If you want to chat with me about buns - until the end of the week I am in California, and then I will be in Bali for two weeks - catch me there. I love everyone, like my photos! Smack! ". Judging by the style, the hostess of the bakery was a young girl. “Probably, with an MBA import diploma, with experience in Big 4, and yes even pretty! Eh, where are my years! ”- I fantasized boyishly, heading for the seventh bakery…
... around which, as it turned out, REAL LIFE boiled! From a beautiful van with the inscription “Buns”, dexterous guys in snow-white aprons were carrying out trays with amazingly smelling (o God, this smell made my legs begin to faint) and passed them inside the store. He led the process of a serious kind of uncle, to whom I turned about “buy buns”. “You see, we unload the car, we have no time!” He suddenly rudely answered me, “Come back in a year and a half, not earlier! Maybe you will have something.
Inside the eighth bakery, they waited for me, do not believe it - a table, a vase with cookies, a wicker chair, and an immaculately looking "bakery industry analyst Sergey" (followed by a firm handshake). It immediately became clear to me that Sergey was familiar with the “bread theme” not by hearsay:
- Our company is not interested in "just buyers." Yes, we do not open arms to everyone! We choose our special partners, as well as only people who feel the market very well come to us! At the moment, we are interested in buyers who own coupon sites, specialized social networks for dentists, photo upload services with geotag, as well as application developers to call the nearest taxi using a smartphone. Our second condition is uniqueness. We are not interested in buyers who have competitors in Russia or abroad. Only unique solutions, only new segments! We do not want to share the market with others - we create our own markets! If you satisfy both our first and second conditions - you are our client! ”
I still do not understand what happened after I rang the bell at the ninth bakery. A lock clattered, and a suspicious type of face poked out through the door chink. Looking at me frowningly, the type disappeared behind a door that slammed shut. I decided to show perseverance and stayed in place. After 10 minutes the door opened again, and already familiar eyes stared at me as if they had seen me for the first time. - "And who are you? What you need? What? Bun? Wait a minute! ” The door closed again. After another 20 minutes, the same head again stuck out from behind the door and saw me, again scared, again pretending that I was a stranger to her! This time the head went on the offensive: - "Are you still here?" And how long will you stand here? Do you have nothing to do? - "Listen to me! I want to. Buy. You. A roll. Loaf, do you understand or not ??? ". The head disappeared again, so that after a while it would appear again: ““ Young man, you have covered our eyes with us all! Don't you understand the Russian language ??? ”I turned around and left.
The evening was coming. And I realized that if I could buy my loaf somewhere, it was only at this very Bakery, which the whole country had been talking about lately. Anger and fatigue engulfed me so much that my hand rose itself, mechanically, and within a minute a taxi with me on board was rushing somewhere away from the city along the Minsk highway ...
I really liked the bakery - glass, concrete. The luxury of a prosperous enterprise! They were very kindly received, literally in a couple of minutes a group of local employees surrounded me, after which we somehow found ourselves in a cozy room with a video projector. - “I wish I had loaves, guys!” - I began, but the guys said that I should first tell about myself. I already did not care, and I told. Then they said that they liked me a lot, that the sale of bread rolls is a serious matter, the process requires coordination, and they strongly suggested that they call again once a week. Cursing everything, I walked back to the car still waiting for me. When we were back on the highway, my mobile phone suddenly rang, and a discouraged voice asked: “What, have you already left?” Why so fast? Yes, of course, the question has already been resolved, but how else? Yes, come back - I will be at the back entrance. Let's go get your loaf together! No, what are you, what a joke! You get a loaf, at the exit immediately give me 30% loaf ... "I hung up.
Taxi again. We are already crossing the Moscow Ring Road. Feeling wild tired of it all. Maybe something is wrong with me? Everyone thinks my desire to buy a loaf is funny? Ridiculous? Or maybe shameful? And you don’t really talk to anyone to explain - everything is on your mind, just know the doors are slamming. Some kind of absurdity ... But someone buys this bread from them! Or maybe the whole industry, damn it, is an invention of ushlyh people who are doing their own unfamiliar business behind the windows with delicious brown rolls of foam plastic? Or is there something wrong with the rolls themselves?
However, no, the industry was clearly not an “invention” - I saw that life was running high behind the windows of bakeries, and well-dressed people rushed back and forth, obviously doing some interesting work - I saw it! The taxi rushed forward, I was nodding, and now my head was spinning fragments of phrases heard on radio and television:
- “Every customer bakeries - personal approach! All offers are reviewed! ”
- “For 9 months of 2012, the sales of buns in Russia increased by 150%! Keep it up, bakers! ”
“One boy bought a loaf from us, and six months later Mark Zuckerberg called him!” World success story. RBC - Russian Bakery Company!
- “At the next meeting with bakers, Dmitry Medvedev expressed complete satisfaction with the pace of development of this widely sought-after industry ...”
It smells like a fisherman.
In the bakery only
No smell!
(based on children's poem)
From the author: Below in the art form my own impressions of the process of searching for venture financing for one IT startup are presented. All coincidences with real names and companies are random, all conclusions from reading this text are on the conscience of the reader.
One morning I went outside to buy a breakfast for breakfast ... The mood was excellent, there was a small change in my pocket, and in my head there were ideas about which of the bakeries to look into, since there were a lot of them in my area.
')
Alas, but the nearest bakery was closed - on the door hung a large barn lock and the announcement: “Dear customers! Our shop sells lots of rolls from 1 million units of goods. If you need only a few pieces, think about how to convince us that you need a million pieces or more! ”
Thank God, across the road, I saw another bakery. Second - and I already entered her door. The seller did not wait:
- Do you want to buy a loaf from us? We would love to, but we serve only trolleybus drivers with a height of at least 182 cm. Sorry and goodbye!
On the threshold of the third bakery, a young man with a badge on his chest "junior assistant to the second seller" smoked melancholically. After listening to my request for bread, he gave me a critical look: "No, I am not interested!". I tried to squeeze through the doorway, but the fellow turned out to be quicker, taking him first and spreading his arms to the sides. “May I come in, I want to talk to your director! Maybe you are not interested, but he will be? ”-“ Gee! If our director had talked with every customer, he would have no time even to devour! ”The young man said and turned his back on me, making it clear that our conversation was over.
But in the fourth bakery a pleasant surprise was waiting for me - the seller agreed to sell me bread, but ... no, I understand that good bread cannot be cheap, but ask for one small slice of 70% of the amount in my pocket! .. In short, I turned and left himself.
The fifth bakery grieved me with a closed door, on which, alas, there was no useful information - neither the telephone nor the e-mail. Nothing at all. “Wow, attitude towards customers,” I thought, and headed for the next bakery, located nearby.
The sixth bakery was the exact opposite of the fifth - this is what “small business facing the buyer” means! The bakery was closed, but the ad reported all the information I needed: “Hello! Our store does not work, but we are fine! If you want to chat with me about buns - until the end of the week I am in California, and then I will be in Bali for two weeks - catch me there. I love everyone, like my photos! Smack! ". Judging by the style, the hostess of the bakery was a young girl. “Probably, with an MBA import diploma, with experience in Big 4, and yes even pretty! Eh, where are my years! ”- I fantasized boyishly, heading for the seventh bakery…
... around which, as it turned out, REAL LIFE boiled! From a beautiful van with the inscription “Buns”, dexterous guys in snow-white aprons were carrying out trays with amazingly smelling (o God, this smell made my legs begin to faint) and passed them inside the store. He led the process of a serious kind of uncle, to whom I turned about “buy buns”. “You see, we unload the car, we have no time!” He suddenly rudely answered me, “Come back in a year and a half, not earlier! Maybe you will have something.
Inside the eighth bakery, they waited for me, do not believe it - a table, a vase with cookies, a wicker chair, and an immaculately looking "bakery industry analyst Sergey" (followed by a firm handshake). It immediately became clear to me that Sergey was familiar with the “bread theme” not by hearsay:
- Our company is not interested in "just buyers." Yes, we do not open arms to everyone! We choose our special partners, as well as only people who feel the market very well come to us! At the moment, we are interested in buyers who own coupon sites, specialized social networks for dentists, photo upload services with geotag, as well as application developers to call the nearest taxi using a smartphone. Our second condition is uniqueness. We are not interested in buyers who have competitors in Russia or abroad. Only unique solutions, only new segments! We do not want to share the market with others - we create our own markets! If you satisfy both our first and second conditions - you are our client! ”
I still do not understand what happened after I rang the bell at the ninth bakery. A lock clattered, and a suspicious type of face poked out through the door chink. Looking at me frowningly, the type disappeared behind a door that slammed shut. I decided to show perseverance and stayed in place. After 10 minutes the door opened again, and already familiar eyes stared at me as if they had seen me for the first time. - "And who are you? What you need? What? Bun? Wait a minute! ” The door closed again. After another 20 minutes, the same head again stuck out from behind the door and saw me, again scared, again pretending that I was a stranger to her! This time the head went on the offensive: - "Are you still here?" And how long will you stand here? Do you have nothing to do? - "Listen to me! I want to. Buy. You. A roll. Loaf, do you understand or not ??? ". The head disappeared again, so that after a while it would appear again: ““ Young man, you have covered our eyes with us all! Don't you understand the Russian language ??? ”I turned around and left.
The evening was coming. And I realized that if I could buy my loaf somewhere, it was only at this very Bakery, which the whole country had been talking about lately. Anger and fatigue engulfed me so much that my hand rose itself, mechanically, and within a minute a taxi with me on board was rushing somewhere away from the city along the Minsk highway ...
I really liked the bakery - glass, concrete. The luxury of a prosperous enterprise! They were very kindly received, literally in a couple of minutes a group of local employees surrounded me, after which we somehow found ourselves in a cozy room with a video projector. - “I wish I had loaves, guys!” - I began, but the guys said that I should first tell about myself. I already did not care, and I told. Then they said that they liked me a lot, that the sale of bread rolls is a serious matter, the process requires coordination, and they strongly suggested that they call again once a week. Cursing everything, I walked back to the car still waiting for me. When we were back on the highway, my mobile phone suddenly rang, and a discouraged voice asked: “What, have you already left?” Why so fast? Yes, of course, the question has already been resolved, but how else? Yes, come back - I will be at the back entrance. Let's go get your loaf together! No, what are you, what a joke! You get a loaf, at the exit immediately give me 30% loaf ... "I hung up.
Taxi again. We are already crossing the Moscow Ring Road. Feeling wild tired of it all. Maybe something is wrong with me? Everyone thinks my desire to buy a loaf is funny? Ridiculous? Or maybe shameful? And you don’t really talk to anyone to explain - everything is on your mind, just know the doors are slamming. Some kind of absurdity ... But someone buys this bread from them! Or maybe the whole industry, damn it, is an invention of ushlyh people who are doing their own unfamiliar business behind the windows with delicious brown rolls of foam plastic? Or is there something wrong with the rolls themselves?
However, no, the industry was clearly not an “invention” - I saw that life was running high behind the windows of bakeries, and well-dressed people rushed back and forth, obviously doing some interesting work - I saw it! The taxi rushed forward, I was nodding, and now my head was spinning fragments of phrases heard on radio and television:
- “Every customer bakeries - personal approach! All offers are reviewed! ”
- “For 9 months of 2012, the sales of buns in Russia increased by 150%! Keep it up, bakers! ”
“One boy bought a loaf from us, and six months later Mark Zuckerberg called him!” World success story. RBC - Russian Bakery Company!
- “At the next meeting with bakers, Dmitry Medvedev expressed complete satisfaction with the pace of development of this widely sought-after industry ...”
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/175835/
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